


fleur de lis

by astrolesbian



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Florist Grantaire, M/M, Mental Health Stuff, Mentions of Alcohol Abuse, Tattoo Artist Enjolras, e/r is the main and everyone else is mentioned, this got so much more intense than i meant it to rip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-04
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-05-31 06:03:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6458776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astrolesbian/pseuds/astrolesbian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire tried to use the language of flowers to create romance. </p><p>It might have actually . . . worked.</p><p>- </p><p>Or, Grantaire is a florist, and Enjolras and Musichetta are tattoo artists, and they just opened up a shop across the street.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [richterscaler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/richterscaler/gifts).



> .....i had to
> 
> happy birthday, sam!!!!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a new neighbor.

Grantaire was trying to decide whether adding tulips to the window display would be Too Much when Jehan walked in the back door, holding the last of a joint between two of xir fingers and smiling like xe had a secret.

“Don’t set off the fire alarm again,” Grantaire said absently, gesturing towards the joint. “Are the tulips too much?”

“It’s Easter,” Jehan pointed out. “Aren’t tulips for Easter? Or is that lilies,” xe trailed off, sitting down in xir favorite swivel chair and staring contemplatively at the ceiling. “I can never remember.”

“Maybe daisies,” Grantaire said. “Or lilac. Lilac would be nice.”

“Mmm,” Jehan agreed, turning around in the swivel chair and flicking the joint into the ashtray. “Try to get different colors. Your last window display was very yellow.”

“I like daffodils,” Grantaire said. “Let me live.”

“Oh!” Jehan said and tossed back xir dreadlocks with one hand. “I forgot! I came in to tell you something. We’re going to have new neighbors.”

“Really?” This startled Grantaire enough that he looked up from the orders list, and focused entirely on Jehan. “Where, the old Starbucks building?”

“Yes!” Jehan looked ecstatic, spinning around in xir chair. The old Starbucks had been on the block for about half a year, until the citizens of the neighborhood -- hipsters that they were -- decided they liked the local coffee shop better and ran a Starbucks boycott in order to run it out of business. 

Grantaire was still astonished that it had worked, as he believed very little in the effectiveness of boycotting, but Courfeyrac who owned the local cafe had been overjoyed at the elimination of competition, so all was well that ended well.

Their street was actually very well rounded, as it was; there was a cafe and a bookstore and a clothes shop and even a bike shop. Grantaire tried to think of another shop which the hipstery members of the neighborhood would embrace and came up empty.

“So what do our new neighbors do?” he asked finally, and Jehan beamed like xe’d been ready for that very question.

“Their names are Musichetta and Enjolras, and they’re  _ tattoo artists. _ I can’t wait. I’m going to get a  _ sleeve. _ ”

Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Tattoos?”

“Yes,” Jehan said. “You know, I think it’s what we needed. We’ve never had a tattoo parlor before.”

“And you’ve been here a long time, have you,” Grantaire said dryly. The two of them had only opened the shop a year and a half ago.

Jehan blushed. “That’s not the point,” xe said. “The point is we should go introduce ourselves and invite them to the bar tonight, and invite everyone else, and we can all get to know each other and be friendly.”

“Does this plan of yours involve little talking birds and spontaneous musical numbers as well?” Grantaire asked, and Jehan frowned at him.

“R --” xe started, and was interrupted by the sound of the door opening.

An incredibly tall person stood there, with long curly hair and a septum piercing, and smiled at them. “Hello,” they said. “I’ve come in for some flowers? I thought they might make the shop look nice. Enj says we don’t need them, but I don’t need to listen to  _ him _ .”

Jehan adjusted xir nametag and beamed at the stranger in that particular Jehan way that could make people xe’d never met before feel like lifelong friends. Grantaire eyed the joint that was still smoking on the table, but decided that if the stranger hadn’t said anything yet they weren’t likely to.

“Are you from the tattoo parlor?” Jehan asked, and the stranger looked surprised. 

“Word travels fast, doesn’t it? I’m Musichetta, but call me Chetta. You’re . . . ?”

“Jean Prouvaire. But it’s Jehan, really. Xe/xir pronouns.”

“She/her,” Musichetta said pleasantly, showing no sign of surprise at the inclusion of pronouns in an introduction, and Grantaire decided she seemed nice enough. 

“I’m Grantaire,” he said, “he/him, mostly. I do the grunt work and understand color theory for the window displays.”

“Grunt work,” Jehan scoffed. “You drive a van to make deliveries.”

“My life is filled with sweat and toil,” Grantaire said, tossing a hand over his eyes, “while Jehan stays here and charms customers and complains about my window displays.”

Musichetta giggled. “I like you two,” she said. “I’m going to have a dinner party tonight to celebrate coming here, would you like to come? I’ve already asked the boys at the bike shop, the cute ones.” An almost imperceptible blush spread over her cheeks.

“You mean Joly and Bossuet?” Grantaire said. “They’re great.” He felt a pleased smile pull at his cheeks. “Quite sappy when they get drunk, always proclaiming their love and kissing and all that rot,” -- Jehan snorted -- “but they’re great.”

Musichetta looked briefly sad, but then smiled. “So they’re together?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if they got married some day,” Jehan said, twirling xir finger around one of xir dreads. “Of course the real gossip is Courf and Ferre. We’ll have to get you up to speed.”

“I think they’ll figure it out,” Grantaire disagreed. “Eponine and Cosette is the real problem. Eponine thinks she’s straight.”

“She did date Marius,” Jehan reminded him, and then winced. “Not that that was a good decision.”

“Sounds like there’s a lot going on,” Musichetta observed, a smile tugging at her cheeks. “Can one of you take a minute to give me a tour? Oh, wait,” she added, sounding upset, “I’m sorry, of course you have to keep the shop open. I didn’t even think.”

“I have to go out for deliveries anyway,” Grantaire said. “I can take a few minutes. What kind of flowers would you like?”

She blinked. “Sorry?”

“Well,” Grantaire said, “I can make the flowers, and bring them to you on delivery, but I might just take a long walk on the way to your shop, and you might be with me, and it might involve a tour.”

Jehan snorted again. “Grantaire, would you like to take your lunch break?” xe said, deceptively sweet.

“I would like that very much,” Grantaire said solemnly, and winked at Musichetta, who beamed back. 

“Well, then,” she said, “daffodils, please.”

“I  _ like _ you,” Grantaire said, and set about getting the flowers.

-

“That’s the bike shop, you’ve been there,” Grantaire said, gesturing over at Joly and Bossuet’s brightly colored storefront, “and right next to them is the bookshop. Feuilly sells his handmade things in there, and he also works shifts when they need him, but it’s mostly just Combeferre and Marius there -- Marius owns it and Ferre works shifts whenever he’s not mooning over Courf or doing something med-school-related.” He took a breath, aware that he was probably talking too much, but Musichetta seemed interested enough.

“Who’s this Courf person?” Musichetta asked.

“He runs the cafe,” Grantaire explained, “he mostly has college students as the baristas but have him make a drink for you if he’s free, he’s a wizard. He’s been in love with Ferre since they met, it’s sickening. They’re basically a couple already except that they don’t know it. Ferre thinks he doesn’t like him, Courf thinks he doesn’t like him, et cetera. We have a betting pool going on if you’d like to join. Leading bet is Eponine, and she thinks the sexual tension will come to a crescendo in a few months and they’ll end up running into each other’s stores and confessing.”

Musichetta raised her eyebrows, and Grantaire waved it off.

“I know. But that’s the sort of thing Courf would do, he doesn’t understand subtlety.”

“Okay,” Musichetta said. “What about there?”

“That’s Floreal’s shop,” Grantaire said. “Quite honestly I don’t know her that well, the only conversation we had was about crystals and chakras and I wasn’t drunk enough to follow it. Eponine’s is next to her, it’s a good bar but I don’t go there much anymore except for social events. Sobriety and all, you know.”

He realized that he was babbling, but he  _ had _ always had a problem of over sharing with complete strangers, so he shrugged and tried to look unaffected and moved on.

“There’s Courf’s cafe, and over here is Cosette’s secondhand shop -- it’s all clothes, but they’re all great. You can walk in there and walk out a new person, I always ask her to dress me for dates. If she likes you she’ll give you a discount, and she likes everyone, so you shouldn’t have a problem. Bahorel runs the gym, except it’s not really a gym so much as it is a knockoff YMCA, all the kids in the neighborhood love him because he can punch a block of wood in half. He and I box sometimes.”

“This is -- you all seem to know each other so well,” Musichetta said, marvelling.

“That’s all Courf and Cosette,” Grantaire said. “Big extroverts. They throw block parties a lot, invite people over, tell us all to meet at the bar after we’ve closed our shops. Everyone’s -- well, really welcoming, I guess. Except for the Starbucks. Remind me to tell you that story.”

“I hope they invite me next time!” Musichetta said. “Here’s the tattoo shop. Come on, you have to meet Enj at least. He’s a little -- well.” She paused, as if searching for the right word. “A little much, sometimes. But he’s incredible.” She held open the door and smiled. “Here, come in.”

“Much obliged,” Grantaire said, and stepped inside the shop. “Where do you want these?”

“Oh, on the desk I think,” Musichetta said. “It’ll give the place a spot of color when you walk in. Reassure people, you know. I was awful when I got my first tattoo, Enj had to talk me down from running off and leaving. I think it was because the waiting area just had no personality.”

“You,” Grantaire informed her, “will fit  _ right _ in with Cosette and Courf.”

She giggled. “I hope that’s a compliment.”

“It is, don’t worry.” He adjusted a few leaves, and stepped back. “There we are.”

“Enj,” Musichetta called up the stairs. “We can finish unpacking later, come down and meet Grantaire, he’s a florist.”

“I told you,” a voice called down, “we don’t  _ need _ flowers,” and Grantaire wondered for a moment if coming here had been a bad idea, because Musichetta’s friend Enj had a fucking gorgeous voice. 

“Yes, we  _ do _ ,” Musichetta said. “And anyway, Grantaire’s coming for dinner tonight, you should meet him.”

“You invited a total stranger to dinner,” Enj said, skeptically, and Musichetta sighed.

“He’s not a stranger, he’s very sweet, and he was polite about pronouns,” she said, “just  _ come downstairs. _ ”

“ _ Okay _ ,” Enj yelled, “okay, okay,” and then he was clattering down the stairs, and adjusting a bandana that held back a loose Afro of bleached curls, and smiling, and oy fucking vey. His arms were covered in tattoos, the lines of the ink delicate and abstract against his brown skin. 

“Hi,” he said, “sorry, everything's a mess up there, I’ve been trying to unpack for two days but  _ someone _ is too busy flirting with the guys in the bike shop.”

Grantaire tried to breathe, and tried to  _ not _ think about the freckles on the guy’s nose, because he was pretty sure it was New Friend 101 to  _ not _ immediately catch feelings for your new friend’s -- roommate? Best friend? Best roommate?

“I’m Enjolras,” the guy said, and reached out to shake Grantaire’s hand. “He/him.”

“Cool,” Grantaire said, and then mentally kicked himself. “Grantaire. Um, mostly he/him. Sometimes not. But I’ll let you know.” He pointed his thumb awkwardly at the daffodils. “I brought flowers.”

Enjolras raised his eyebrows.

“I mean, not for you! Or for Chetta, or for anyone, specifically, I just, I mean, I brought them. Because Chetta wanted some color. And flowers are -- flowers are a color. Fuck.” He let go of Enjolras’s hand, which he had now been shaking/holding for far too long, and looked over at Chetta, who was laughing. “Fuck, stop laughing at me.”

“You’re very cute,” she said, and winked. “But anyway, the boys in the bike shop are dating each other, so I think it’s a no go. They’re coming over tonight too, by the way.”

“Have you invited the whole neighborhood?”

“Look,” Chetta said, “I know that on weekends you like to curl up with popcorn and watch the Food Network and complain about how they aren’t properly seasoning their chicken while you watch me get ready to go out and have fun, but tonight I’m bringing the fun to you, and you’re gonna like it.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes. “I don’t watch the Food Network  _ every _ weekend.”

“No,” she agreed. “Sometimes you watch HGTV. Or that nature channel with all the documentaries.” 

He groaned, and looked at Grantaire. “She’s ruined any chance I have of seeming interesting to you now,” he said, actually sounding upset, which was a miracle after the  _ flowers are a color _ thing.

“She might have to try a little harder,” Grantaire said, and felt his neck immediately go red. “You still seem plenty interesting to me.”

Then he turned and fled, because Chetta was raising her eyebrows in a way that suggested she knew what Grantaire’s heartbeat was doing, and say what you wanted, but he was very good at running away from his problems.

“Enjoy the daffodils,” he called, and the door swung shut behind him.

He was halfway down the street when he realized his heart hadn’t stopped pounding.

“ _ Fuck, _ ” he said, with feeling, and headed home.

-

Jehan, of course, noticed the moment he came in the door that something was different.

“What happened?” xe asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Xe brightened suddenly.  _ “Have _ you?”

“No,” Grantaire said. 

“Oh,” Jehan said. “Last block party, Courfeyrac and Floreal and I were talking about the laundromat, Courf thinks it might be haunted. What  _ have _ you seen?”

“An angel,” Grantaire said gravely, flopping into Jehan’s vacated swivel chair and staring at the ceiling. 

Jehan spun the chair until Grantaire’s turned-up face was facing xir’s. 

“Explain,” xe said.

“Musichetta’s friend,” Grantaire said. “He had  _ sleeves, _ and  _ freckles. _ ”

“ _ Oh, _ ” Jehan said, and released xir grip on Grantaire’s shoulders. “I  _ see. _ What’s his name?”

“Enjolras,” Grantaire said. He leaned the chair back farther so that he could see Jehan’s face, which was a mixture of concerned and scheming. “Oh, no.” 

“No what?” Jehan said, quickly changing xir expression to be one of contrite sympathy. 

“Just no,” Grantaire said. “You had a look on your face, like -- like you were going to try something, and I’m perfectly fine, thank you --”

“You are so  _ paranoid --” _

“I told him  _ flowers were colors, _ ” Grantaire said. “I want him to forget I exist, not date me.”

“But you kind of want him to date you, too,” Jehan said.

“Be that as it may,” Grantaire said, “you won’t help.” The chair wobbled dangerously, and Grantaire ignored it.

“Who says I won’t?” Jehan said, looking offended. 

“You were the one who suggested that we should base the bets in the Courf and Ferre pool on a page you read on TVTropes.”

“They’re very trope-y,” Jehan said defensively. “And I haven’t been proven wrong yet, the date I predicted hasn’t passed.”

“ _ TVTropes, _ Jehan.”

“Even so --”

“R!” a voice called, the door opening, and Grantaire jerked and fell out of the chair.

“Oh  _ no _ ,” Jehan said, mournfully, and then there were small, pale hands gripping Grantaire’s wrists and pulling him upright, and then those small hands were gripping his chin, and Joly’s soft, calm voice was saying  _ I’m so sorry, look at me, I just have to check your eyes -- _

“Hell of an entrance, guys,” Grantaire mumbled, but his pride was already thoroughly bruised from the  _ flowers are a color _ incident, so he didn’t mind Joly’s fussing much.

“He’s fine, Joly,” Bossuet said, reaching out and taking his boyfriend’s hand off Grantaire’s chin. “He’s survived worse. Remember when Bahorel clocked him? He had a black eye for weeks.”

“Well,” Joly said, doubtfully, “his eyes seem okay, at least.” He allowed Bossuet to help him up, and then walked over to the chair in the corner of the room, sitting down on it and balancing his cane against the wall. “We saw you with Musichetta! Isn’t she nice?”

“Oh, yes,” Jehan said cheerfully, “she invited us over for dinner so she could get to know us.”

“Oh,” Joly said, and shared a disappointed look with Bossuet. “Oh, we thought -- well, anyway.”

“You thought what?” Grantaire asked. 

“Oh, no, it doesn’t matter,” Joly said dismissively. “But I’m glad you’re coming! And we can all meet her friend, too.”

“R met him,” Jehan said, and wiggled xir eyebrows. “He came in here afterwards looking like he’d been through a hurricane, and collapsed in a chair, and said  _ I’ve seen an angel --” _

_ “Traitor,” _ Grantaire said. 

“Oooh, R!” Joly said, and Bossuet grinned and ruffled his hair. “What does he look like? No, don’t tell me, I want to be surprised. He won’t be as pretty as Chetta, though. I mean --”

Joly had gone suddenly very red, and Grantaire had a vivid flashback to the last time he’d seen Joly blush that red, which had been before he and Bossuet were together.

“So,” Jehan said, obviously having picked up on it as well. “Musichetta’s very nice, isn’t she?”

“Well,” Joly stammered, twisting his fingers together. “I mean --”

“Yeah,” Bossuet said. “She was flirting with us, I think.”

“She  _ was? _ ” Joly squeaked.

Grantaire laughed. “She seemed pretty taken with you both when she came in here.”

“But -- she -- you didn’t  _ tell me, _ ” Joly said, looking upset. “I would have flirted back!”

“That’s why I didn’t tell you,” Bossuet said. “I love you a lot, babe, but you’re useless at flirting.”

Jehan snickered. 

“I am not,” Joly said, and frowned. “Am I?”

“Yes,” Grantaire said. “I remember when you two were in the early relationship stage and not the permanent honeymoon stage. Half the reason I would drink so much was to forget Joly’s awkward flirting.”

“Fuck off,” Joly said, looking more relaxed. “Should we ask her out?”

“I think we should wait,” Bossuet said. “She might have just been flirting with me, not both of us. I am pretty irresistible.”

“You are,” Joly agreed, and Jehan mimed gagging as they kissed. “But maybe we could talk to her, anyway. If she’s not poly then she’s not poly, but we should at least ask, right?”

“Mmm,” Bossuet said, and sat down at Joly’s feet, leaning his head on Joly’s knee. Joly rested a hand on his neck, because he had no hair. They were, Grantaire decided, almost sickeningly adorable.

“What are we going to do about R?” Jehan asked, xir eyes sparkling, and Grantaire groaned. 

“Let it go, Jehan.”

“No, tell me again how he was an  _ angel, _ ” Jehan said, and Bossuet laughed.

Grantaire leaped up, pretending to suddenly have remembered something. “So much work to do,” he said, while Jehan giggled, not believing him. “Flowers, and deliveries, and . . . things.”

“Dinner is at six,” Jehan called after him, still giggling, as he went into the back of the shop.

-

“What’s that?” Jehan asked, arching xir eyebrow. 

“What? Nothing,” Grantaire said, defensively, because Jehan could see full well that it was a bouquet of flowers. He’d put in snowdrops for hope and pink roses for friendship and was debating more daffodils for new beginnings, even if they had plenty of those already.

“It’s a bouquet,” Jehan said. “Hope and --”

“I know what it says,” Grantaire said. “It’s for both of them.”

Jehan arched an eyebrow.

“Okay, fine, it might mostly be for him,” Grantaire admitted. “But it’s fine! It’s just friendship, I didn’t put any love flowers in there --”

“They’re roses,” Jehan pointed out.

“Fuck,” Grantaire said. “Fuck, you’re right, what other flowers mean friendship --”

“Fleur de lis means that the friendship means a lot to you,” Jehan said. “With the ones that mean hope --”

“It says ‘I hope my friendship will mean a lot to you’!” Grantaire said. “Nice. Perfect.” He carefully replaced the pink roses with the fleurs. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“Well,” Jehan said, and slid a single pink rose into the middle, “one couldn’t hurt, could it?”

Grantaire stared at the bouquet for a second, trying to calm the nervousness in his stomach. It was ridiculous. He was just going over to have dinner with a new friend with all his old friends and  _ maybe _ Enjolras would be there too and he was bringing flowers, because that was what he did, he was a florist, and he couldn’t bring wine anymore, and shit --

“What if she has wine? At dinner?”

Jehan slipped xir arm around Grantaire’s waist.

“Then we won’t drink any, will we?” Xe kissed Grantaire’s cheek, and smiled. “Let’s go.”


	2. two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a dinner party.

“These are fleur de lis!” Enjolras said, excited, the moment he saw the bouquet. Chetta shot him an amused look, and he felt his cheeks go hot. “I mean -- thank you, and everything, it’s just that one of my favorite tattoos is a fleur, did you see it before, or something?”

Grantaire, the florist, shook his head, looking bemused. “No, I -- it’s the language of flowers. Fleurs are one of the flowers of friendship.”

Enjolras, acting on reckless impulse, tugged the edge of his tank top up, and pointed to the edge of his fleur tattoo peeking out from under his binder. Which, thinking of . . .

“Have you had it on all day?” Musichetta spoke up, worried, her attention diverted from the two boys from the bike shop.

“I mean -- yes, but dinner --”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” the lone stranger in the room said, smiling encouragingly. Enjolras thought they must be the other of the two florists. “R is always after me to make sure I’m resting my ribs, he won’t make you wear it on ceremony, and I would hope none of the rest of us would.”

“Yeah, of course!” one of the bike shop boys said, the bald one with the wide smile. “I mean, it’s on you at the end of the day, but you don’t have to wear it if you need a rest.”

“Rib bruising is very serious,” the shorter bike shop boy said.

“Go on and change,” Musichetta said, shooing him with her hands.

“Speaking of,” Grantaire said, narrowing his eyes at the other florist, “how long have you been wearing yours, Jehan?”

Jehan raised a hand. “Not all day, I swear. Only a couple hours.”

Grantaire squinted at Jehan, but seemed to accept it. “Okay. Take it off if you need to.”

“Yes, _Mother,_ ” Jehan said pleasantly, and wrapped an arm around Grantaire’s waist, kissing his cheek affectionately. Enjolras’s stomach did something sad and twisty, and he turned and rushed up the stairs, taking them two at a time. Grantaire’s laugh rang out from the floor below, and he looked in a mirror and told himself to get his shit together.

“So he might have a relationship already,” Enjolras told his reflection, feeling a little ridiculous. “That’s fine. It’s just like Chetta and the bike shop boys. You can handle this like an adult and be friends with him, or whatever.”

He took off his binder, dug around in his closet for his baggiest hoodie, and tugged it on. He looked at himself in the mirror again.

He was still wearing the bandana in his hair, but it looked -- fine. He didn’t need to look anything other than fine. Nothing was going on.

 _Nothing,_ he told himself firmly, was going on.

He made clumsy finger guns at his reflection, then felt like an idiot, and then went back down the stairs.

Jehan grinned at him. “There you are. We thought you’d gotten lost.” Enjolras smiled, and Jehan smiled back. It was hard not to like Jehan, even with the whole “might be in a relationship with Grantaire” thing.

“Jehan, xe/xir pronouns, co-florist with R at the shop,” xe said. “Well, Jean Prouvaire, but that’s very formal, don’t you think? Have you met anyone on the street yet besides us? I think you and Feuilly would get along. I don’t know you that well, of course, but sometimes I can get a feel for people, and anyway, Feuilly gets along with everyone.” Jehan tossed xir dreads over xir shoulder and looked expectantly at Enjolras for an answer.

Enjolras blinked. “No, I’ve only met R, and now you, and the -- the bike shop boys.”

“Their names are Joly and Bossuet. Joly’s the short one and Bossuet’s the tall one. They both use he/him, before you ask. Joly doesn’t have a gender -- he and I talk about that sometimes -- but he still uses he/him. They’re comfortable pronouns for him, or something. R uses he/him too, except for when he doesn’t. But he’ll always let you know when he wants to use they/them, so just keep an ear out. What are your pronouns, before I forget to ask?” Jehan took his arm and led him over to the table, looking at him expectantly.

“He/him,” Enjolras told xem. “Are there -- other people I should meet?”

“Well,” Jehan said, “it’s not like we know every single person on the street, I don’t know what R told you,” xe made a face at Grantaire, sitting across the table and talking to Chetta, “but we have our friends, and our regular customers. R and I have this sweet old lady who buys her husband flowers every week. Or they might be for her cat, I’ve never asked. Will you give me a tattoo?”

“Now?” Enjolras said, bewildered, having lost track of the conversation.

“Not _now,_ ” Jehan said, “but sometime. I want a sleeve. I’ve always wanted one. So does Courf, except he’s stuck between a rock and a hard place because he’s afraid of needles.” Xe patted Enjolras’s arm. “Think about it!”

“I mean -- of course. You can be our first customer. But you need to pick out a design --”

“Flowers,” Jehan said, immediately. “All kinds. I want my arm to be a meadow.”

Grantaire was there, suddenly, pulling up a chair on Enjolras’s other side. “Thought I’d leave Chetta and the boys alone for a minute,” he said, in an undertone. “Things are going well. I think Bossuet might get her phone number as long as Joly doesn’t try to flirt.”

“What?”

“Joly is _awful_ at flirting,” Jehan said, in just as soft a whisper. “Terrible. Dreadful. I can’t think of any other synonyms, but he’s very bad.”

“Anyway,” Grantaire said, “the point is that Joly and Bossuet both think Chetta is cute, and I’m being a good wingman.”

“But I thought they were dating each other,” Enjolras said. “Chetta said she didn’t think they were interested.”

“Well, they weren’t sure if she was interested in them both or just in Bossuet,” Grantaire says matter-of-factly, “and they’re a bit of a package deal.” He shrugged. “I told them to go for it, though. Couldn’t hurt.”

“You should take your own advice,” Jehan said sweetly.

“You should be quiet, Casanova,” Grantaire said, and rolled his eyes.

“I hope it works out,” Enjolras said. “She deserves that. Not that relationships are the only thing a person has to live for, but it’s like you said. They don’t exactly hurt.”

There was a calm silence, and Grantaire smiled and shook his head. “You’re right,” he said. “I hope so too.”

“I’m going to put your flowers in water,” Enjolras said, and then added, a little recklessly, “thank you. I really -- I really like them.”

Grantaire smiled. “Well, good,” he said. “You ought to give me a tattoo sometime in exchange.” He winked, to show he was kidding, but Enjolras’s stomach swooped dangerously. (Maybe at the wink. Maybe at the idea that Grantaire might get a tattoo that involved removing his shirt. Either one.)

“Any time,” he said, his voice too high, and Grantaire’s smile went a tiny bit softer, and Enjolras wanted to kiss him _very badly_ and so Enjolras wheeled around on his heels and went into the kitchen, because there was probably something there that needed checking, and he was good at avoiding his problems when he wanted to be.

He stood around staring blankly at the pot on the stove for a moment before Chetta joined him, raising her eyebrows.

“Honey,” she said, “you can’t cook.”

“I just thought --” he started, and then sighed. “No, I didn’t.”

“Mm,” she said, knowingly. “It’s Grantaire, isn’t it?”

“He’s --” He meant to say _really cute_ or _really nice_ or something, but couldn’t get it out. “He’s so --”

“Hot?” Chetta suggested. “He is. He’s deceptively hot. You don’t really think so, and then he smiles like he does, and it just hits you.” She hit him with her hip and moved to stir the pot on the stove. “I think he likes you. He brought flowers.”

“Those were for both of us.”

Chetta made a face at him like he was being deliberately obtuse. “Enjolras,” she said, “I’m not an idiot. He gave those flowers straight to you, with a look on his face like it was going to break his heart if you didn’t like them. You weren’t looking, but when you got excited about them, he smiled so big -- you made his day.” She gives the pot a final stir. “Think about it.”

Enjolras watched her walk away. “Hey,” he said, just before she made it to the door. “You should -- ask them out. The bike shop boys. I have it on good authority they like you.”

She blushed. “You think?”

“Yeah,” he shrugged. “I mean, think about it.”

“Okay,” she said, and grinned, sudden and monumental. “I will.”

-

“I know this is probably the most annoying question a person can be asked,” Grantaire said, after they’d all eaten. “But is there a reason behind any of the tattoos?”

“Why would it be annoying?” Enjolras said. “People ask me that all the time.”

“You must have the patience of a saint,” Grantaire told him. “I hate when people ask me about things. Like when they ask why I _mutilated my ears_ .” He flicked the back of his ears, which, now that Enjolras actually looked, were stretched with gages. “I figured it’d be even more annoying with tattoos, everyone thinks they have to be _for_ something.”

“Do you think that?”

“Hell no,” Grantaire said. “I believe in doing things for the aesthetic.” He’s grinning, but Enjolras still can’t tell if it’s a joke or not.

“Well,” he said, “some of them are for something. The fleur is for France. There’s one I have for Chetta and I -- it’s this one.” He gestured at the design of slim, interlocking circles on the inside of his left arm. “She designed it, and I designed one for her. We were a little drunk at the time, but it came out okay.”

Grantaire laughed. “How about that one?” he asked, reaching up and touching the tattoo behind Enjolras’s ear, the triangle. Enjolras shivered, trying to resist the urge to lean into his touch.

“It’s -- see the dots, where the lines connect? Those are freckles. Chetta connected them for me.”

“Is there a reason for that one, or is it just pretty?” Grantaire asked, and Enjolras shrugged.

“I used to hate my freckles. I thought they were ugly. This sort of . . . makes them into something I like.” Grantaire nodded, and Enjolras shrugged again, feeling awkward. “That’s it, though. The rest are just because I like how they look.”

“You know what you should tattoo on me?” Grantaire said. “A Fibonacci Spiral.”

Enjolras wrinkled his brow. “What’s that?”

“It’s this thing, in art,” Grantaire said, waving his hands as he spoke, as if to illustrate it. “This spiral shape, like a shell on the beach, and it’s the source of all natural beauty in the world -- anything from Da Vinci to a good photograph on Instagram to that one movie you have to watch over and over again because it’s framed just right. It’s all the Fibonacci Spiral. It all comes back to that.”

“That seems awfully limiting,” Enjolras said, cautiously, not wanting to sound like he thought it was stupid.

Grantaire shrugged. “Maybe,” he says. “But at least it’s beautiful. At least you can see all that beauty in everyday things. And anyway,” he added, “it would remind me of you.”

Enjolras hoped to God no one could tell how fast his heart was beating. “How so?”

Grantaire cocked his head, and looked at him very steadily, a small smile on his face. “You said that at dinner. How you thought humanity was beautiful, even if we’re the shittiest thing this planet has to offer.” His smile went wider and softer, all at once. “I could do with a bit more of that in my life.”

“It’s not all I talked about,” Enjolras said, his mouth dry, his heart pounding. Grantaire laughed.

“Okay,” he said, “then close to it, at least.” He tilted his head again, like he was looking inside every part of Enjolras he’d ever tried to hide, like he liked what he saw there. “You don’t make much sense to me.”

“I don’t?”

“Nope,” Grantaire said. “I happen to think humanity is pretty fucking disgusting, to tell you the truth.”

“Why?”

“Why not?” Grantaire said. “No one’s given me a reason not to think so so far.” He grinned. “You could give them a run for their money, though.”

“Really?”

“Really.” Grantaire stood up and dusted off his pants. “I should get going. It’s late.” Were his cheeks red, or was that Enjolras’s imagination? “I’ll see you. Soon. I’ll see you soon.”

Enjolras stood, too, to lead him to the front door, and the urge to kiss Grantaire came back in full force. He rocked back on his heels, embarrassed and blushing, and Grantaire gave him another one of those soft smiles and took a step back.

“I’ll see you soon,” he said, again, and Enjolras nodded, maybe a little too hard.

“Sure, of course, anytime,” he babbled, and Grantaire laughed, and reached up with one hand to the back of his neck, and Enjolras wanted to lean forward and kiss him _so badly._

He could imagine it. The scrape of Grantaire’s stubble against his mouth, his hands in Grantaire’s hair, Grantaire’s hands at his waist, holding on --

He bit his lip and looked away. He didn’t even know how Grantaire felt about all of it -- all of everything. He shouldn’t just --

“You should come to Courf’s tomorrow,” Grantaire said. “I’ll introduce you to all our friends.”

Enjolras nodded so fast he was sure he must have looked like a bobblehead. “That sounds good.”

“Cool,” Grantaire said. “Make sure you, um. Check the water for the flowers every morning.”

“Okay.”

“Cool.”

“Cool.”

“Go home, R,” Chetta said, from the doorway, looking hopelessly amused. “We’ll see you soon.”

Grantaire jumped. “Right! Right. Jehan already -- already left. Right. I should go.” He waved, and Enjolras’s heart skipped around a bit, stupidly. “Bye, then.”

“Bye,” Chetta said, her smile still a bit amused. “Walk safe.”

“Bye,” Enjolras said. “See you at Courf’s.”

“I’ll buy you coffee,” Grantaire said, and then ducked out the door. Chetta burst into giggles.

Enjolras whacked her with a pillow. “Shut up!”

“It’s sweet!” she said, laughing. “Really, it’s sweet.”

“I wish I knew how to,” Enjolras said, and made a gesture with his hands in an attempt to describe what he was thinking. “How to do things. Romantic things.”

“Well, you could say, ‘I like you a lot, would you like to go on a date,’ couldn’t you,” Chetta said. “Worked fine on me.”

“Wait, what?” Enjolras said, and sat up. “Really? Chetta!”

She smiled, and wrapped her arms around herself. “Joly said he thought I was beautiful and Bossuet said they both did and I swear, I melted.”

“That’s wonderful,” Enjolras said. “I think it’s -- good. That we came here."

“Oh, Enj,” Chetta said fondly, and gripped his hand. “I think it’s good too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is a little shorter than the last. enj is so much harder for me to write than r, aaaaaah . . . i'm also not 100% sure about this chapter as a whole, but here it is anyway, because i've been sitting with it in my drafts for two days. 
> 
> last chapter coming soon!


	3. three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> introductions are made, and grantaire tries to be a functioning human being with little to medium success.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this fic is apparently going to be longer than i anticipated. i don't know what's happening anymore.

Grantaire sat up in bed, picked up his phone, and thought vaguely about texting Enjolras to see when he would want to go get coffee and meet Courfeyrac, and then realized that he’d never actually given Enjolras his number.

His head hit the wall with a thunk. He was an  _ idiot. _

“Jehan,” he said, loudly enough that it could be heard through the wall. Jehan answered him with a loud groan. 

“It’s  _ early, _ ” xe said, and then there was another thunk, which was probably the sound of one of Jehan’s shoes or books hitting their shared wall.

“You’ll knock over your plants,” Grantaire yelled, and there was another thunk.

“Don’t tell me what I’ll knock over,” Jehan yelled back, and Grantaire imagined xem tugging xir blankets over xir head and curling back up in bed.

“Did you get Chetta’s number?” he called, and was answered only with what kind of sounded like a growl.

Grantaire sighed, and rolled out of bed.

He contemplated his appearance in the mirror for a moment, trying to understand why he still looked perpetually hungover even if he hadn’t touched wine in months. His hair was a mess, his eyes were bloodshot, and the bags under his eyes would probably get rejected as a carry-on by airport staff. He looked like shit (and too chubby and too ugly and too --)

Then he rolled his eyes at himself, because apparently it was going to be one of  _ those _ days. 

“Jehan,” he called again, a little softer, but still loud enough to be heard. No matter how annoyed Jehan was with his bullshit, xe had never turned down a chance to help when he felt like garbage, which was what you wanted in a best friend, quite honestly. “Can I come in?”

There was a grumpy silence, then -- “Sure.”

Grantaire laid down next to Jehan on xir bed, and didn’t say anything. Jehan, quietly, curled an arm around his waist.

“I think I wanna go back to sleep and hope maybe I can fool my brain into thinking it’s tomorrow when I wake up,” Grantaire said. “Try to play a trick on depression, or something.”

Jehan made an understanding noise. “Okay,” xe said. “Let me know if you want to talk.”

Grantaire didn’t answer, but then again, he didn’t need to. It was better already, just by virtue of being near someone who loved him easily and softly and without qualifications.

“Is it bad bad or medium bad?” Jehan asked.

Grantaire considered it. “More like momentarily bad. It was really shitty for a second, but now it’s better. Or, like, easier to ignore.”

“Okay,” Jehan said. “Let’s keep ignoring it, then.”

“Cool,” Grantaire said, and tugged Jehan’s blanket over on top of himself. 

Jehan ruffled his hair and yawned. “You’re a good person, R,” xe said. “And you’re a good person whether or not you feel like shit.”

Grantaire didn’t answer -- he couldn’t, just then -- but it felt good to hear, even if he couldn’t quite bring himself to believe it.

-

He woke up again later feeling only sort of better, Jehan’s soft hands running through his hair. But it was the kind of better that led to getting out of bed and taking a shower and not being overwhelmed by it, so he managed a smile at Jehan and sat up. 

Jehan smiled back. “Bad bad or medium bad?”

“Medium,” Grantaire said. “I think I’m gonna shower.”

“That’s good,” Jehan said. “I bought the shampoo you like, the kind that smells like mint.”

“Thanks,” Grantaire said, meaning it, but it came out dull and flat. Jehan didn’t seem to mind, and went back to reading whatever it was xe was reading. Grantaire stumbled into the bathroom and turned on the water, turning it as hot as it would go, and tugged off his shirt.

He tried not to look at himself in the mirror. Why add to his misery?

Then he felt like an overdramatic idiot, because it was still that sort of day.

“Here goes,” he told the noisy shower, and stepped in.

Standing in the shower and soaping his body gave him ample time to reflect on why he was such a fuckup and what he should do about it, which usually led to additional reflecting on the years he’d spent self-medicating with whatever he could get his hands on before he met Jehan and Joly and Bossuet and Eponine and kind of realized that wasn’t what people did. It hadn’t meant he’d stopped, of course, not right away. He’d just felt even more useless for being unable to deal with life in the way seemingly everyone else did. 

Eventually, though, he’d been put in hospital for his liver, which meant that it was probably time to buck up and get sober. 

“I doubt you feel like it,” Jehan said, once Grantaire was sitting at their kitchen table and rubbing at his hair with a towel, “but we did say we would go to Courf’s and introduce everyone to everyone today. I can call and cancel. They’ll understand.”

“I think I could go,” Grantaire said, after thinking about it. “I’ll just feel like a huge dick if we cancel and that won’t help at all. Maybe it’ll distract me to go out.” He’d already taken a shower, which he hadn’t thought would happen when he woke up. Maybe it was going to be one of the good sort of depression days, where you could go around as normal while being numb and cold on the inside.

It was sort of fucked up that “numb and cold but acting fine” constituted a good day, when he really thought about it, but that was irrelevant.

“Anyway,” he added, to Jehan, who looked unconvinced. “I can always leave. We can make up a flower emergency.”

“Monday is our day off,” Jehan pointed out, but xe looked amused all the same. “The whole shop is closed, they’ll never buy it.”

“Fine, then we’ll say you left the stove on and we want to get home before your collection of Keats hits the flames.”

Jehan whacked him gently in the shoulder. “Don’t even joke about that.”

Grantaire grinned, and it took effort, but when Jehan smiled back, it was worth it.

“I’ll text them then, and tell them to meet us at Courf’s,” Jehan said. “We can go ahead and get coffee and wait for them there.” Xe busily tapped something out on xir phone, and Grantaire put another bite of cereal in his mouth. It tasted like dirt, which was pretty par for the course on days like this. Objectively, he knew he had to eat to survive and shit, but surviving didn’t really seem like a good enough side effect to put in the effort of eating on bad days, so he pushed the cereal away and went to find a really baggy sweater, both because it effectively hid the chub on his stomach and because he felt like he might need the comfort today. He tugged one of Eponine’s old scarves around his neck as well, to have something to hide his face in, and put his hair into a bun, and avoided looking in the mirror on his way out. 

“Let’s go, then,” he said to Jehan, who linked xir arm through his and led him outside.

-

Courf’s cafe was already overflowing with frazzled university students, all of them biting pencils and drinking too much coffee and staring at their books with red-rimmed eyes. This was confusing for a moment, until Grantaire’s eyes registered the sign above the counter that read  _ Stay here for more than five hours and get a snack free! Happy finals week :)  _

Jehan giggled, and Grantaire pushed his sunglasses off his face and onto his forehead to find Courf leaning over the counter and talking to Combeferre, a single curl falling into his eyes and his megawatt smile on in full force. Ferre was grinning back, in a soft, quiet sort of way that only ever seemed to make an appearance when Courf was talking to him alone, his round glasses slipping down his broad nose. 

“They’re so cute,” Jehan said in a louder whisper than was strictly necessary. “What are the bets again?”

“I don’t think the bets count anymore,” Grantaire said. “Courf’s entered them.”

“R!” someone said, and then Cosette’s small, soft arms were wrapped around his middle. She smiled up at him, her pastel hair tied into a French braid, and he smiled weakly back.

“Hi, ‘sette,” he said. “Did the uni students leave us any coffee?”

Cosette wrinkled her nose. “What’s the use of knowing the owner if we can’t get drinks whenever we want them?”

Jehan gently took her arm to make her stop hugging Grantaire and turn her attention to xem instead, which Grantaire appreciated more than he had words for. Cosette was sweet and kind and endlessly warm, but all those things tended to make Grantaire feel like shit on Bad Days, even if they were well-meaning. 

There was pop music blasting over the radio, and the whole place smelled of coffee and chocolate and hazelnuts, and Courf was smiling at them now from the counter, adjusting his apron and straightening his bow tie. “Hey, kids! What can I get you?”

“Kids?” Jehan said, xir eyebrows arched. Courf shrugged.

“It was the first gender neutral thing that came to mind besides  _ babes.” _

“Call us  _ babes _ next time,” Jehan said. “I’m not a kid. I just have a baby face.”

“Noted,” Courf said. “Want coffee?” 

“No,” Grantaire said. “I only came here for the  scintillating conversation.”

“Okay, one, I don’t know what the fuck that means,” Courf said. 

“Interesting. Fascinating. Brilliant. Lively. Stimulating,” Combeferre said.

“Thanks, Ferre,” Courf said. “Two, fuck you, because I know you love my lattes.”

Grantaire smiled, and it felt like peeling a scab. He was always particular about not letting anyone know on a Bad Day, especially because it usually did nothing except make them tiptoe around him and make him feel even more guilty for being such a depressed mess of a human, so he didn’t say anything, even though the  _ fuck you _ stung. 

“Whatever,” Jehan said. “Cosette, I want to hear about your date with Eponine.” 

She whacked xem in the arm. “It was  _ not a date, _ ” she said. “God. We just went out for dinner.”

“That’s not exactly a date,” Courf said. “I mean, me and Ferre do that all the time.”

“Because you two are just outstanding examples of a non-romantic relationship,” Jehan said. “Really. Bravo for that one.” 

Courf stood up, very quickly. “Oh, would you look at that, a customer, which means I don’t have to sit here and listen to these  _ lies _ and  _ slander _ and  _ abuse. _ ”

“Grantaire?” the customer said, and Grantaire turned his head to see that it was Enjolras, looking dangerously attractive in a button-up shirt rolled up at the sleeves, his forearms visible and tattooed and freckled. Grantaire swallowed. 

“Hello,” he said, because it seemed like the thing to do in a situation like this. 

He was suddenly rethinking the intelligence of coming here today, because every cell in his brain was suddenly firing off thoughts like  _ he looks really fucking good  _ and  _ freckles _ and  _ you will never ever be good enough for someone like him you piece of shit _ and it was really kind of a buzzkill. 

Jehan curled xir pinkie around his and gave him a stern look, as if xe could sense his thoughts.

“Hi,” Enjolras said, and then, slightly hesitantly, “are these your friends? Chetta stopped at the bike shop to see Joly and Bossuet, I think they’re all going out tonight, and --” He went red and stopped talking. “Sorry. I talk too much.”

“You talk a normal amount,” Cosette disagreed. “Courf talks too much.” 

“That’s true,” Courf said. “Hello. I’m Courfeyrac, I’m pansexual, which does not mean I’m sexually attracted to pans, ha ha, we’ve all heard that joke, it’s not funny, my parents are from Brazil and if I fuck up a verb or something that’s why, yes, the name of the shop is a pun, no, I didn’t think of it, that was Ferre, blame him, I like cats and documentaries about animals and ice cream and social justice, I live for drama, and I was a cheerleader in high school, which I find always explains how much I talk to people. That’s the condensed version. If you want the full version, come round to my place later, I have scrapbooks of all my significant life moments.”

Enjolras blinked at him. “I have absolutely no idea if you’re kidding or not,” he said. “I’m Enjolras. He/him pronouns, I’m really gay, my mother was from France and my father was from Haiti, I really like the pun. It’s clever.”

“I like him!” Courf said. “R, where did you find him?”

“Around,” Grantaire said. “He was my friend first, you don’t get to steal him.”

“Too late,” Courf said. “I already have.”

“I’m Cosette,” Cosette interjected. “I’m Chinese, because everyone always asks where I’m from and roll their eyes when I say France. Me and R are presidents of the Bi Kids With No Gender Club. I’m cool with any pronouns except he/him. Has R shown you around?”

“We only met a day ago,” Enjolras said. “He was going to show me around today.” He blinked at Combeferre, who blinked back.

“I’m Combeferre,” he said. “I’m a med student and I work at the bookshop. He/him.”

“Nice to meet you,” Enjolras said. “What kind of doctor do you want to be?”

“I’m going to be a neurologist,” Combeferre said. 

“That’s the study of  _ brains _ ,” Courf said, and sighed, propping his chin on his fist. “He’s so smart.”

Combeferre stuck his tongue out at him. “I’m supposed to be studying right now.”

“You haven’t eaten anything for at least twelve hours besides Red Bull,” Courf said. “It was my civic duty to make you a sandwich.” He pointed at Cosette. “No comments about me being the wife in this relationship, please.”

“That would be sexist,” Cosette said. “I wouldn’t do that anyway.”

“Even so,” Courf said. 

“How long have you two been together?” Enjolras asked, sitting down at the counter, and Courf burst into nervous giggles. 

“Together? What? What’s that? I mean . . . I mean I have to go,” he said. “I have to -- go. Things. The back. I have to go.”

Combeferre watched him go, and then sighed, once he was far enough away to not hear it.

“Every time I think I’m getting somewhere,” he mumbled, and then turned to Cosette. “I know you say he likes me too, but I’m really not seeing the results of that.”

“He’s a sweet nervous ball of sunshine,” Cosette said wisely. “And he’s much more in love with the idea of love. A relationship scares him, especially since he likes you so much. He’ll get over it, and you’ll pass your exams, and you’ll be a rich doctor and he’ll be your handsome trophy husband.”

“He’s worth much more than a trophy husband,” Ferre mumbled, staring in a depressingly lovesick way off into the back of the shop. “I just wish he’d realize we’ve been going on dates. I take him for dinner all the time. I have it in my  _ budget. _ I set money aside for date night, and we aren’t even together.”

“Courf is an idiot,” Jehan said. “He’s a sweet and kind and loving idiot, but he’s still a bit of an idiot. He’ll come round.”

“Also,” Grantaire said, “he doesn’t know you like him back.” 

Combeferre looked despairing. “I’m so  _ obvious. _ ”

“Yes, you are,” Grantaire said. “But he doesn’t think he deserves you. That’s how it is. He doesn’t think he’s worthy of you or that someone like you could ever like him. Believe me. I speak from experience.” Jehan’s fingers tapped at his back. Enjolras was looking at him, tilting his head.

“I can’t imagine you ever feeling like that,” he said.

Grantaire swallowed. “Well,” he said. “Depression’s a bitch.” He stood up, clapped his hands. “But I’ve overshared enough. Want to meet everyone else?”

-

“So how much --” Enjolras said, and then paused. “How well do you all know each other, anyway? How did you all meet?”

Grantaire shrugged. “I don’t know. I went to the gym to make use of the barre, Jehan loves coffee more than anything, Cosette sends flowers to her father every week, Courf loves clothes. Courf and Cosette are a really formidable pair of extroverts, and they love block parties. Take your pick, really.”

“The barre . . . that’s a ballet thing, right? You dance?”

“Not professionally or anything,” he said. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I just like to pick a song and run with it sometimes. Bahorel walked in on me after the first couple times I’d come in, and he and I were friends after that. We box together, and I teach him dances, that kind of thing.”

“That’s still cool, though,” Enjolras said, smiling and shoving his hands into his pockets. “And . . . block parties?”

“Courf and Cosette usually arrange those,” Grantaire explained. “We’ll probably have one soon, to celebrate you and Chetta moving here, they’ve been looking for an excuse to throw one for ages.”

“What are they, though?”

“You’ve never been to a block party?” Grantaire asked, and Enjolras shook his head. 

“No. What are they like?”

“Pretty fun. We drag tables out from all our shops, and we all bring food and booze, and we all just talk, and sometimes someone will turn on music and everyone will dance, and sometimes we won’t, and sometimes we’ll drag out Feuilly’s fire pit and roast marshmallows. It’s nice.”

“They drink?” Enjolras said, and Grantaire shrugged. 

“ _ They _ do. I’m not totally without conviction. I can stay away from wine when I need to.” And if he’s having a bad day, he just doesn’t go. “That’s Cosette’s shop, but it’s her lunch break, so we’ll leave it for now. This is the bookshop, Feuilly and Marius should be in.”

The bell jingled, but Marius didn’t look up from his book, which was probably in Chinese or Hebrew or something. Grantaire leaned over the counter looked. It was Hebrew.

“Oh!” Marius said, jumping. “Hello, R! Can you read any of it?”

“I haven’t read anything in Hebrew since my bar mitzvah,” Grantaire said, “which was a long time ago. I’m very old.” 

“You’re only twenty-four,” Marius said.

“And now you’ve ruined any chance I have of seeming adult and worldly,” Grantaire sighed. “Oh, well. Marius, this is Enjolras. Enjolras, this is Marius, he likes languages and has confusing political opinions.”

“Nice to meet you,” Enjolras said automatically, then narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean by confusing?”

“They change a lot,” Marius said. “I’m not very -- decisive.” He fidgeted uncomfortably and tugged on some of the hair at the back of his neck. Grantaire took pity on him.

“Where’s Feuilly?”

“Over here, R,” Feuilly’s voice called, and Grantaire grinned at him. 

“Hey!” he said, and tapped their fists together. “You got your hearing aids fixed. Good for you, man.”

“I had to practically fight the doctors to get them to admit it was covered by my insurance,” Feuilly said, and rolled his eyes. “But yeah, I got new ones. Thank god, I was sick of Marius editing out swears from what I said.”

“I did it  _ once _ and it was a  _ joke _ !” Marius said, exasperated. 

“Whatever,” Feuilly said, grinning. “Who’s this, R?” He indicated Enjolras with a tilt of the head, and Enjolras waved at him, slightly awkwardly.

“I’m Enjolras,” he said. “You’re Feuilly?”

“In the flesh,” Feuilly said. “Nice to meet you. Are you R’s boyfriend or something?”

Grantaire had a feeling that was probably similar to swallowing his own tongue as quite a lot of self hate came back in full force. “In  _ what _ universe,” he managed to say, “do I have my shit together enough to have a boyfriend,” and Feuilly laughed, and Enjolras smiled nervously, and Grantaire attempted to tell his brain to fuck off with the self hate and shit but only ended up thinking  _ in what universe could someone like me ever be with someone like him.  _

“For the record,” Marius piped up, “I think you would be a great boyfriend, R.”

Grantaire shrugged in an attempt to keep things light and breezy. “I steal the blankets.”  _ And I think about killing myself at least once a week. _

“So do I,” Marius said, and frowned. “Do you think that’s why Cosette and I broke up?”

“You and Cosette broke up because your romance was ill-fated from the start and based on you seeing her once and deciding she was, quote unquote,  _ the one, _ ” Feuilly said. “You can’t idolize people like that.” He sat down behind the counter. “Also, romance is overrated.”

“You’re aro,” Marius said. 

“Hence  _ overrated, _ ” Feuilly said. “I mean, you like it, that’s fine. I just don’t get it. You two are still friends and all.”

“That’s our cue,” Grantaire said. “They can debate the merits of romantic relationships for hours.” He waved, grabbed Enjolras’s elbow, and made a speedy exit.

Enjolras was laughing. “I liked them a lot,” he said. “You have nice friends.” He was smiling, and Grantaire’s hand was still on his elbow, leading him along the street. Grantaire took it off, hastily.

“They’re not bad,” he said. “Once you get used to them.”

“Is there anyone else for me to meet?” Enjolras asked, and Grantaire shrugged, lifting his hands into the air in a  _ who knows _ gesture. 

“Floreal will probably show up to the block party. Eponine is working at about now, and Gavroche’ll be with Bahorel because Bahorel babysits on Mondays. Other than that, I don’t think so. And now’s probably not a great time for me to enter a bar, so Eponine is out unless one of the others takes you.”

“I’m sorry,” Enjolras said. “Is it . . . bad, today?”

“Everything is bad today, pretty much,” Grantaire said, then made a face. “Sorry. I don’t -- I shouldn’t talk about it.”

“I don’t mind,” Enjolras said softly. “If it helps.”

It  _ would _ help, Grantaire thought, which was precisely the problem. They’d only met two fucking days ago, now was not the time to unload all the crippling depression  _ bullshit _ . “No, it’s fine, I usually don’t --”

“Grantaire,” Enjolras said, and caught his wrist, moving his thumb over the pulse point. “If I can help you at all, I’d like to.” He bit his lip and turned his head away, nervously. “I mean -- I know it probably doesn’t help much, because it’s  _ me, _ and you don’t know me that well, but we’re friends, and I want to help, you just -- I don’t like to think of you being unhappy.” He frowned. “I mean, not that it’s about me! Or how I feel! I just --”

Grantaire wished he had the mental energy to laugh, but he just sort of wanted to cry. It was so goddamn  _ nice _ of him. “I get it. Don’t worry.” A smile tugged at the side of his mouth, but wasn’t quite strong enough to really make itself known. “Thank you.”

“Just let me know what I can do,” Enjolras said stubbornly. “Anything at all.” His eyes were earnest and open and brown and gold, and Grantaire felt butterflies, but as if they were from far off, trying to get into his body instead of already in it. 

Grantaire looked down at Enjolras’s hand on his wrist. “Come back to the cafe with me, then,” he said, with a smile that he was sure looked tired and blank, but it was the closest thing he could give to the real thing, and it would have to be enough. 

Enjolras slid his hand down Grantaire’s wrist until their fingers were laced together, and he squeezed. “Okay,” he said. “Lead the way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay for projecting onto fictional characters to help with your own mental health, i guess?


	4. four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jehan and bahorel find out if enjolras is boyfriend material.
> 
> also, there's a group chat.

Grantaire texted him about a week after the day at the cafe and the bookshop, announcing that Courf and Cosette were throwing a block party and he’d better be prepared. About two minutes after, Enjolras was added to a group chat titled _operation BLOCK PARTY 2K16!!!!_

The first text in the chat was from Courf, and contained only laughing cat emojis and party streamer emojis.

Enjolras snickered.

 _coffeeyrac: who is ready to PARTY??_  
_catsette: me me me!!_  
_catsette: ep is here too. says she will bring TONS OF BOOZE. but we have to pay 4 it._  
_coffeeyrac: convince her otherwise_  
_coffeeyrac: with ur MOUTH_  
_jehan: courf what kind of bad jokes…..._  
_feuillyyy: that wasn’t even a joke. 0/10. blocked. unfollowed. reported._  
_baehorel: same_  
_catsette: your negativity can’t cockblock me >:) _  
_marius: good luck i guess?_  
_catsette: thanks :)_  
_ponine: im literally in this chat sette_  
_catsette: i mean ?_  
_catsette: since were here ?_  
_catsette: wanna date / bang ?_  
_catsette: be girlfriends™?_  
_ponine: sure thing babe been waiting for you to ask_  
_catsette: YAY_  
_coffeeyrac: YAY FREE BOOZE_  
_ponine: in ur wildest dreams u coffee fucker_  
_baehorel: RT_  
_R: woah looks like im late 2 the party_  
_R: congrats ponine_  
_R: i mean im still devastatingly single but good to kno ur gonna get some action_  
_ferre: RT_  
_marius: RT_  
_coffeeyrac: RT!!!_  
_R: lmaoooo nah but rly, congrats_  
_ponine: thx dude_  
_ponine: btw can u watch gav tomorrow night me and sette are gonna go over to hers_  
_R: sure i love gav_  
_R: i can take him to the movies or smth_  
_R: who wants to come w me and gav to the movies so no one thinks im a single father_  
_marius: i’ll go!_  
_baehorel: sounds cool bro_  
_ferre: have to study sorry_  
_chetta: sure! sounds fun :)_  
_jollllllllly: oooohhh chetta bossuet and i were gonna ask if you wanted to go out :(_  
_chetta: never mind R i have my boys to think about_  
_bossuet: your boys? ;)_  
_chetta: MY boys ;) ;) ;)_  
_feuillyyy: gross_  
_coffeeyrac: RT_  
_ponine: RT_  
_jehan: RT_  
_enj: RT_  
_chetta: wtf enj leave me alone!!_  
_R: hey enj was wondering when u were gonna stop lurking_  
_enj: hey grantaire :)_  
_coffeeyrac: ooooohh a smiley face. SCANDALOUS._  
_R: shut tf up coffee fucker_  
_catsette: so are we gonna plan this party or not??? i have things 2 do_  
_ponine: im things_  
_R: get ur own chat_  
_ponine: fuck off_  
_coffeeyrac: ANYWAY!!!_  
_coffeeyrac: is friday good for everyone? i’ll get stuff from the bakery_  
_catsette: no i can go mom gives me a discount_  
_coffeeyrac: awesome get like, eclairs and cream puffs and cookies and shit_  
_coffeeyrac: everyone needs to bring a food too_  
_R: i call mac n cheese_  
_jehan: i’ll make salad_  
_baehorel: ILL DO BURGERS_  
_enj: chetta can confirm that i should not be near a kitchen, ever, lest the kitchen burn down_  
_jehan: “lest”_  
_baehorel: where did we find this guy i love him_  
_chetta: yea he’s terrible (at cooking) (and most other things)_  
_enj: wow fuck you too_  
_chetta: AWWW YOU KNOW I LOVE YOU!!!_  
_chetta: anyways i’ll bring chips or something_  
_ponine: someone please bring real food_  
_ferre: i’ll make a vegan option!_  
_feuillyyy: fuck it UP ferre i love you let’s date (platonically) (make me food that’s what i’m saying)_  
_ferre: sure :)_ _  
R: ooh, a smiley face, scandalous ;) ;) ;) ;) ;)_

Enjolras chuckled and tucked his phone into his pocket, just as the front door of the shop jingled and opened.

“Hey,” someone said, grinning widely and waving a hand. “I’m Bahorel.”

“You’re in the group chat,” Enjolras said, then felt like it sounded stupid and winced, but Bahorel just grinned.

“Yeah! I realized we never got introduced. Also, I wanted a tattoo, and today seemed like as good a day as any, right?”

Enjolras felt himself smile, a wide, genuine one. “Awesome!” he said, not caring if it made him sound like a ten-year-old. “What kind of design were you thinking? Chetta’s better with lettering, if you want something with words you should wait for her to come back. But I’m pretty good at abstract things like this,” --he gestured to the inside of his arm, where Chetta’s friendship tattoo was-- “and any kind of small minimalist design, because those are pretty easy. Anything else I can draw out for you first before I put it on your body because we should definitely make sure you’re happy with it first, because it’s not the kind of thing you want to be kind of sure about, you have to be super sure. But it’s not like I’m gonna send you away to think about it. I love seeing people get tattoos.”

“Sweet!” Bahorel said. “Can I show you what I was thinking of?” He was bouncing on his heels, all enthusiasm, and Enjolras smiled.

“Sure, c’mere.” He gestured towards the desk he and Musichetta used to draw designs, and pushed a stack of paper over to Bahorel, along with some pens. “Go ahead.”

Bahorel shook his head, and reached into his pocket. “I have a design, actually.” He drew out a piece of paper, slightly crumpled, which he smoothed out and placed on the table. It was an anatomically correct heart, drawn in a series of geometric shapes; abstract and yet immediately understandable. Enjolras grinned.

“This is amazing.”

“R drew it,” Bahorel said, casually. “He’s fuckin’ awesome.”

“Yes, he is,” Enjolras said, too enthusiastically, and then tried to tone it down with little success. “He’s really nice. And this is -- he’s really good.”

Bahorel grinned fondly. “R is a good guy. I mean, we all want everyone else to be happy, but it kinda goes double for him with all the trouble he’s had.”

“Trouble?”

“I mean, I don’t know how much he’s told you, so I don’t wanna spill all his shit unless he wants you to know,” Bahorel said, shrugging. “But he’s had a rough couple of years.”

“Yeah?” Enjolras said, worrying a bit of his lip between his teeth. “How long have you known him?”

“Only since he moved here,” Bahorel said. “But we were friends pretty fast. Jehan’s known him the longest -- since college, maybe? A long time, anyway. He’s hard to shake, our R.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean once he loves you, he never lets go unless you ask him to,” Bahorel shrugged, like it was something mediocre like “Grantaire likes mangoes” and not something so personal and precious that Enjolras could barely respond. “He’s -- I don’t know. It takes a lot to make him not like someone once he’s made up his mind to. I’m easier. If you mess with my friends, I’m out.”

Enjolras considered that.

“We moved because I got arrested,” he said. “I punched this guy in the face for calling Chetta slurs.”

Bahorel blinked at him, and he shrugged, suddenly feeling uncomfortable.

“I just mean -- I get it, that’s all,” he said. “About not letting anyone messing with your friends.”

“Would you punch someone and get arrested for any of us yet?” Bahorel said, interested. “Are we at that friendship level?”

“I’ve been reliably informed by multiple officers of the law that punching is not how we solve problems,” Enjolras said, instead of saying _probably yes any of you because you have already been so good and welcoming and I just want to keep this forever._

“Fuck that,” Bahorel said. “Come to my kickboxing classes. R’s in them. You can meet people, make friends, learn to throw really good punches. Kickboxing can be really awesome for people of your size and weight, too, because you can get tricky with it and use it as a weapon. It’s sick. I wish I could do it.”

“Well,” Enjolras said, “even with T I’ll probably never have a beard like that, so we’re probably even on the, you know, envy scales.”

Bahorel grinned. “I do kick ass at no-shave November,” he agreed, “but seriously, you should come. R would be really psyched. He’s awesome at boxing, but he’d never admit it.”

“I think I’ll try it,” Enjolras said, and smiled. “It sounds fun. Should we get started on your tattoo now?”

“Sure thing, man,” Bahorel said. “Hit me. I had Ep wax my chest and everything for it.”

Enjolras laughed. “Are you going to take off your shirt, or am I going to have to buy you dinner first?”

Bahorel grinned. “Okay, okay, keep your hair on.”

-

Jehan waltzed into the shop much later in the evening, xir locs pulled into a messy bun with a single daisy tucked behind xir ear. “Hello!” xe said, waving and reaching up to flick at the bell Chetta had hung on the door. “This doesn’t work.”

“We’re trying to fix it,” Enjolras admitted. “It’s mostly for decoration now, though.”

“It’s sort of charming,” Jehan said. “Anyhow, I came over to ask you to get coffee with me.”

“Coffee?”

“Yes,” xe said, adjusting xir shirt, which had a delicate, lacy pattern. “R didn’t want to come. He likes tea, but coffee used to make the shakes worse so he never really drinks it anymore.”

Enjolras nodded, because he wasn’t sure what to say. “I wouldn’t mind some coffee.”

“Oh, good,” Jehan said, and offered an elbow. “Come on, then. Courf is closing soon, he always makes the uni students go home and sleep at around ten.”

“Why did you want to get coffee with me?” Enjolras asked, because he didn’t have a filter.

“I just realized I didn’t get to know you yet,” Jehan said, cheerily. “R’s been monopolizing you.”

“I don’t mind,” Enjolras said, and then felt his ears go hot, and hoped Jehan didn’t notice.

Xe didn’t seem to, just kept smiling, steering the two of them towards Courf’s shop.

“Is he okay?” Enjolras asked, to fill the silence. “R, I mean. He was having a bad day yesterday.”

Jehan gave him a soft sort of smile and squeezed his arm. “He’s fine,” xe said. “Today is one of his better days. He’s been on the roof, painting.”

Enjolras instinctively looked up at the top of Jehan and Grantaire’s building, frowning when he couldn’t see anything. Jehan squeezed his arm again, a little more firmly.

“I promise he’s fine,” xe said. “I wouldn’t have left him alone if things were really bad.”

“Oh, no, I didn’t think you would have, I just,” Enjolras said, and then sighed. “I’m being really ridiculous, I’m sorry.”

“You’re worried,” Jehan said, “I think it’s sweet. What kind of coffee do you like?”

“Um,” Enjolras said, “iced. It’s sweet?”

“Of course,” Jehan said, and smiled encouragingly. “R could always use more people who care about him, I mean, couldn’t we all?”

“Well, I care about all of you,” Enjolras said. “You’re all -- I just really want to be friends.” He laughed, a little. “That sounds pathetic.”

Jehan’s eyes twinkled. “A little.”

“No, but,” Enjolras said. “It’s nice to meet people -- I mean, other people who are trans, or gay, or bi like Chetta. It’s nice. There wasn’t a community like that where we used to live. It’s just good to know all of you, I guess.”

“I felt the same way when I first met R,” Jehan said, accepting xir coffee from the barista -- not Courf-- and sipping it. “It was like, _finally,_ you know?”

“Are you and R, um,” Enjolras said. “Dating?”

“I’m aro,” Jehan said. “So no. But I love him a lot, he’s my best friend. I want to see him happy, I’d do anything to see that. You know?”

Enjolras smiled, and thought of Chetta. “Yeah.”

“Well, anyway,” Jehan said, smiling and folding xir hands. “Tell me about yourself. What do you like to do?”

“Huh?” Enjolras said, which just screamed intelligent.

“I like to get to know my friends,” Jehan said. “Go on, tell me things. Anything at all.”

“Um,” Enjolras said. “Well . . .”

-

_jehan: he seems nice. a good, round kind of nice, not a flat nice._  
_baehorel: you think?_  
_jehan: yeah. i think he’d be good for R._  
_baehorel: he seemed to like him a lot_  
_baehorel: like i namedropped a little and talked about stuff R was good at_  
_baehorel: he got this cute excited look on his face_  
_jehan: me too!_  
_jehan: and he asked me how R was doing_  
_jehan: like granted that could just be him being a good person but_  
_jehan: i dont know_  
_jehan: i think he likes him_  
_baehorel: well i don’t wanna try to get them together or anything tho_  
_jehan: oh yeah of course not_  
_jehan: R would hate that_  
_baehorel: yeah_  
_baehorel: but it’s good to know that he’d be good_  
_baehorel: n they’d be good together_  
_jehan: i just want my son to be happy_  
_baehorel: isn’t he like 4 yrs older than you_  
_jehan: shhh he’s my son  
_ _jehan: :)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a lil shorter this time! it was gonna be longer, but i totally ran out of steam for it. if i hadn't published it as it was, this fic never would have been updated.
> 
> one more chapter is left -- the block party! where we will have kissing and Feelings and things. stay tuned!


	5. five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> r gets a tattoo (& a boyfriend).

Grantaire gets up the courage needed to text Enjolras on his own after only five days of sort-of-flirting in the group chat, which is some kind of record for him, probably. 

> _R: so hey abt that tattoo i said i wanted_
> 
> _enj: yeah?_
> 
> _R: do you think we could do it today? i mean there’s the block party later so we could do it before that_
> 
> _enj: that sounds good! i don’t have any appointments today_
> 
> _R: oh right you’re open mondays_
> 
> _R: if you wanna do it another day that’s cool_
> 
> _enj: i just said i don’t have appointments :) it’s fine!_
> 
> _enj: works out perfect actually. i was gonna ask if you wanted to hang out today, at least now i’ll be working and not leaving chetta to do it all_
> 
> _enj: which i don’t do often! just! you’ve been really busy! i haven’t gotten to see you much_
> 
> _R: yeah, graduation season. also mother’s day. they’re rly big flower times_

“He _wants_ to hang out with me?” Grantaire asked the ceiling. “What the fuck?”

> _enj: ooooh yeah that makes sense._
> 
> _enj: do you know what you want yet? the tattoo?_
> 
> _R: i mean i want a shitload of different tattoos so i’m probably just gonna show you all of them and you can tell me which you think would hurt least_
> 
> _R: my pain tolerance is shit so_
> 
> _R: can i come over now or?_
> 
> _enj: yes if you want! we’re still setting up so that’ll be like 15 min_
> 
> _enj: but it’ll be really nice to see you even if we can’t get started yet_

Grantaire put his phone down on his comforter and looked at the ceiling again. “Nice to see you,” he repeated. “What the _fuck._ ”

> _R: k cool ill be there soon then_
> 
> _enj: awesome!_

“What the _fuck,”_ he said, for the third time. There was a loud bang from Jehan’s side of the wall.

“R, what’s wrong?” xe called, and Grantaire sighed and went into xir room, collapsing next to xem on the bed.

“Enjolras is going to give me a tattoo,” he said. “And he said it would be nice to see me.”

Saying it out loud, it’s pretty fucking dumb, and _more_ than pretty fucking desperate.

“Sounds fun,” Jehan said. Xe was painting xir fingernails bright blue, using nail polish and one of Grantaire’s more worn out paintbrushes. Grantaire squinted at xem.

“Where did you get that?”

“You’d put it in the trash,” Jehan said. “I reclaimed it. It’s good for the environment to recycle.”

“Yes, but --”

“And now you’ve been distracted a little, and the tattoo doesn’t seem like such a big deal, does it?” Jehan continued, and Grantaire wanted to flip xem off, except that xe was right. “Anyway. Listen to me. You are kind and smart and incredibly loveable, and Enjolras likes you. You’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know how to do this,” Grantaire said. “Unrequited is much more my style.”

“Tough,” Jehan said, unsympathetically. “No one knows how to be in love. There’s no rulebook for it. You just go, and you do it the way you need to and you want to and that’s all that matters, okay? Now get out of my room,” xe added, taking a smaller paintbrush and drawing a pink flower onto one of xir nails. “And go put on a tank top, because it’s going to make you nervous to take off your shirt.”

“ _What?”_

“For the _tattoo,_ R. Now go.”

Grantaire went.

 

The tattoo shop was much more put together than it had been the last time he’d been inside it; there were flowers in a large jar sitting on the front desk, which made him smile. He remembered Chetta buying them a few days ago, but he’d thought they were for Joly and Bossuet.

There were a few binders stacked on the table, filled with tattoo designs, so Grantaire tapped the bell on the desk and tugged a binder into his lap, sitting down to flip through it. Chetta’s designs were detailed and pretty, with lots of flowers and patterns and faces. Enjolras, by contrast, seemed to be trying to find out how few lines he could put into a tattoo with people still understanding what the tattoo was. Grantaire smiled as he flipped through them, pausing on a page with watercolor tattoos, the colors blurring together with only a few black lines -- abstract and weird and kind of beautiful.

“Hey!” Enjolras said, and Grantaire looked up, smiling.

“Jehan would love something like this,” he said, gesturing at the watercolors. “I don’t know how well it would work with xir skin tone, though.”

“Ugh, yeah,” Enjolras said, sitting down next to him. “But we could tweak the colors a bit, and it would work better. That’s what we did with Chetta’s.”

He was wearing the red bandana again, to hold back his curls, and when he reached up to adjust it Grantaire noticed a tiny tattoo on the side of his index finger, one he’d never seen before.

“What’s that?” he asked, before he could lose his nerve, and Enjolras smiled at it.

“It’s, um,” he said. “The day I first started T. I know it -- shouldn’t be necessary, and that bodies have nothing to do with gender, and that I don’t need to appear typically masculine to be a boy, but -- I don’t know. It helped. And people stopped misgendering me all the time, which was pretty cool.”

“Huh,” Grantaire said. “Did it hurt, getting a tattoo on your finger?”

“Yeah,” Enjolras said. “But it was over fast. Why, do you want one?”

“Yes,” Grantaire told him, and looked at his own hand, trying to mentally trace out where the tattoo would be. “A date, just like you, August ninth, last year.”

“Why?” Enjolras said. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

Grantaire swung his legs a little, and thought, _what the hell._

“I went to the doctor,” he said. “For a check up. He told me that if I didn’t stop drinking, I would only have a couple years to live.”

Enjolras sucked in a breath.

“Yeah,” Grantaire agreed. “Funny, really. For all those years I was depressed, and I wanted to die -- but actually being confronted with it? I didn’t want to anymore. So I went home and I tossed all the wine in the apartment, and stayed in there for about a week. I had the shakes, too. It sucked. But I’m still alive, and I still want to be alive. And it’s better than it was.” He laughed. “I want the Fibonacci Spiral, too, don’t think I’ve forgotten it, but we can do two in one day, right?”

“Hey,” Enjolras said, softly, and reached out, taking Grantaire’s hand. “I just wanted to say that -- I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad you stayed alive.”

Grantaire grinned at him, trying to lighten the mood. “We better stop talking about it, though. This is getting really deep for a first date.”

Enjolras’s eyes widened, and Grantaire realized what he’d said.

“Wait, fuck, I mean -- sorry. Sorry! I know this isn’t a date.” He’d ruined it. Ruined everything. “Why would you even -- why would _we_ even -- this is clearly -- this isn’t date stuff,” he added, talking way too fast. “This is just like, spending time together, because we’re friends, and talking about personal shit, and you -- fuck, it sounds like date stuff. But it’s not. I don’t think that it is. I just --”

Enjolras cut him off. “What if I want it to be?” he asked, and Grantaire gaped at him.

“Sorry, what?”

“What if I want it to be date stuff?” Enjolras was twisting his fingers together, and he almost looked -- _nervous,_ which literally made no fucking sense, _at all_ \--

“You’re gonna have to run that by me again, because I just feel like I’m hearing things at this point,” Grantaire said, and Enjolras rolled his eyes, and squeezed Grantaire’s hand, and they were still holding hands, apparently, which was kind of awesome but also kind of incredibly scary.

“I want to date you,” Enjolras said, and yeah, okay, there was no misinterpreting that. Grantaire looked up at him, and he was smiling -- kind and still a little nervous.

It was the nervousness which calmed him down, weirdly enough; if Enjolras was nervous it meant that this _meant_ something, that there was no way this was a joke.

“You just -- I mean, you’re really cute, obviously, and you’re really funny and smart, but you -- you care so much about all your friends, and I -- I really like that about you,” Enjolras said, stammering through it. “I just think it’s incredible, how much you love them.” Grantaire watched as he put his face in his free hand. “This sounds really dumb. I’m sorry. I’m not -- good at this.”

“It’s okay,” Grantaire said, and laughed a little bit, because this was awkward and weird and that made it _real_. “I like you too, obviously. Despite you being terrible at compliments.”

Enjolras laughed too, leaning in to press their foreheads together. “I’ll practice,” he said. “I just -- I really, really like you. I might not have any idea how to do this, but I’ll figure it out. I promise.”

Grantaire wondered what you said to something like that. “I really like you, too,” he said, and it sounded inadequate, but that was okay. They had time. They’d figure it out. “D’you wanna get lunch sometime?”

Enjolras’s grin was so happy that Grantaire thought it practically counted as an answer.

 

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” Grantaire asked, after Enjolras had gently shaved the hair off his bicep and gotten all the ink ready for the tattoo. “I mean, I didn’t say anything because I have incredibly low self-esteem and a shitload of self worth issues, but you don’t seem to have any of that, so.”

“Looks can be deceiving,” Enjolras said, turning on the tattoo gun. “I was -- I wasn’t nervous around you, exactly, but I’m much better at talking to a crowd than I am at talking to one person. And I liked you.” He shrugged. “I’ve had crushes, and I’ve had friendships. But you were both. I didn’t really know what to do with that. So I was just trying to be your friend first, and hope you felt the same way about me that I did about you.”

Grantaire tilted his head. “That’s ridiculously sweet of you, you know.”

“I guess so,” Enjolras said. “From my end it seems more likely I was scared of rejection.”

“Pssh,” Grantaire said. “As if anyone would reject you.”

Enjolras smiled, a little sadly. “You’d be surprised.”

And Grantaire -- he didn’t know what to say to that, so he just -- leaned forward, close enough to press a kiss to Enjolras’s sad, smiling mouth.

“Well,” he said. “No rejections from me.”

Enjolras’s smile goes softer. “Or from me.” He clears his throat. “Does that mean we’re boyfriends, then?”

“Oh,” Grantaire says, with a false, put-upon sigh, “I _guess._ If you _want._ ”

Enjolras rolled his eyes. “ _Grantaire._ ”

Grantaire beamed at him.

“Shut up,” Enjolras said, even though he hadn’t said anything, and flicked him on the cheek. “I’m starting now, remember to breathe.”

Grantaire grinned and fluttered his eyelashes exaggeratedly. “When I look at you, I always forget to breathe.”

“Shut _up,_ ” Enjolras said, but he was laughing, so it was a success. “God, are you always that bad at flirting?”

Grantaire winked, feeling light as a feather, happier than he’d been in days. “Stick around, babe,” he said. “Maybe you’ll find out.”

Enjolras leaned over and kissed his cheek. “I hope I do,” he said, with sincerity that shocked Grantaire all over again, and got to work on his arm.

It hurt. Grantaire had expected that from the beginning; no one walks into getting a tattoo without knowing it will hurt. But Enjolras was careful and serious as he traced the Fibonacci Spiral onto his skin, and maybe Grantaire wanted the tattoo to remind him of everything that was beautiful and perfect in the world, but now it’d make him think of Enjolras, too, and the cute way he bit his lip when he was focused.

He grinned to himself. There were worse things to carry on your body forever.

 

It looked good, when all was said and done. The Spiral was all thin black lines, and it seemed weirdly delicate, especially in comparison to Grantaire’s stocky body. But he liked it, and how it looked on him, like how it looked when Jehan painted his nails or when he drew something on his jeans. Enjolras smiled at it.

“It’ll take a bit to heal,” he said. “So I think we should wait to do the one on your finger, you don’t want both sides of your body healing at once. But it looks good, R. It looks really good. It -- it suits you, somehow.”

Grantaire grinned back at him.

“We’ve still got a bit before the block party starts,” he said. “What should we do?”

“Don’t you think we should help set up?” Enjolras asked, chewing on his lip. “They might need us.”

“Mmm, no, I can think of other things we could do,” Grantaire said, taking Enjolras’s hand, but he still wasn’t getting it. He opened his phone, frowning at it.

“No, see, Courf is asking for people to come and move tables,” he started, and Grantaire groaned dramatically, plucking the phone from his hand and setting it down.

“Or we could make out,” he said, pointedly, raising his eyebrows. There was a part of him saying _shut up you shithead, he doesn’t want to kiss you, why would he,_ but then Enjolras smiled at him, still biting his lower lip, and that part of him shut up remarkably quickly.

“Or,” Enjolras said, “we could do that.” He tugged on Grantaire’s hand, pulling him up until he was standing. “But not in here, there’s lots of sharp things around and --”

“Upstairs,” Grantaire suggested, swinging their linked hands between them and feeling rather nervous -- but a good kind of nervous, an anticipatory kind. Like riding a rollercoaster. “On your couch. I like your couch, it’s comfy.”

“Should have known you were only dating me for couch access,” Enjolras said, already tugging them towards the stairs. “Come on, then, I want to kiss you.”

“You’re very matter-of-fact about this,” Grantaire said, because it’s not like he was excruciatingly nervous, himself, but Enjolras was just nodding and leading him along as though they’d been doing this for months and not minutes.

Enjolras giggled -- honest to God _giggled_ \-- and Grantaire realized he was wrong, this _was_ Enjolras being nervous. He was just trying to hide it by acting like he knew what he was doing, which was kind of endearing, when you got down to it.

“I’m nervous too, you know,” he said, and Enjolras looked back at him, there on the stairs, and leaned over and kissed him.

It was just a soft, dry peck, and then it was over, and Enjolras was looking marginally more relaxed, and more like his usual self. Grantaire smiled.

“And we don’t have to make out,” he added. “We can sit on your couch and watch _Kitchen Nightmares_ for all I care, so long as you’re there and I’m there.”

“No,” Enjolras said. “I want to make out, actually, I’m just -- I haven’t done this much.”

“Hey,” Grantaire said, shrugging, “neither have I. We’re in the same boat.”

Enjolras breathed out, slowly, and looked at him.

“You know,” he said, “that actually does make me feel much better.”

“Well, you know,” Grantaire said, and kissed him again, there on the stairs; drawing it out a bit, making it slower and more comfortable. Grantaire quite liked kissing, and kissing _Enjolras_ was already a whole different experience that he liked even more, but he knew that he wanted them both to be happy, with this. And Enjolras melted into it, sliding his arms around Grantaire’s neck and kissing him back, soft and exploratory. “That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it?”

“That’s not all you’re here for, I hope,” Enjolras said, and Grantaire laughed as they finally finished climbing the stairs.

“Oh, no,” he said, and kissed Enjolras again before pulling back and letting go of his hand. “I’m also here for the couch.”

He ran over to it and flopped down, careful to avoid laying on his tattooed bicep, and listened to Enjolras laugh from behind him.

“Asshole,” Enjolras told him, eyes sparkling. “I knew you were only using me to get to my furniture.”

He sat down on the couch and flung his legs over Grantaire’s, reaching out and taking his hand again. Grantaire smiled at him, and reached out to adjust the bandanna he was wearing.

“To answer your earlier question,” he said, softly. “Yes. I would love for us to be boyfriends.”

Enjolras just looked at him for a second, grinning, warmer and brighter than sunshine, and then leaned against Grantaire’s shoulder and buried his smile against his neck.

“Good,” he said, finally. “I’d like that too.”

 

“Hey, check it out,” Grantaire said, later, fishing his own phone out of his pocket. “We’re late for the block party.”

“Oh, _shit_ ,” Enjolras said. “I have to get dressed. And put my binder on.”

“It’s not fancy or anything, don’t bother dressing up,” Grantaire told him, and let go of his hand. “I’ll text them and tell them we’re alive.”

Enjolras clattered up the stairs to his and Chetta’s bedrooms with no further comment, and Grantaire replied to Jehan’s texts. 

> _jehan: where are you_
> 
> _jehan: tattoos dont take this long_
> 
> _jehan: [finding nemo voice] MY SON WHERE IS MY SON_
> 
> _R: um did you even watch the movie? nemos dads name is marlin_
> 
> _jehan: R!!!!!!_
> 
> _jehan: ur okay!!_
> 
> _R: yeah_
> 
> _R: me and enj are like_
> 
> _jehan: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!_
> 
> _R: boyfriends now_
> 
> _jehan: that’s so good he’s so nice_
> 
> _jehan: he really likes you!!!_
> 
> _jehan: i scoped him out the other day_
> 
> _R: you what???_
> 
> _jehan: i just went and talked to him relax i didn’t even mention you_
> 
> _jehan: i just wanted to see if he liked you too and he DID and i KNEW it and this is so great i’m so happy for you!!_
> 
> _jehan: i’m totally gonna tell him about how you said he was an angel_
> 
> _R: I’LL BURN YOUR EDGAR ALLEN POE ILLUSTRATED COLLECTION_
> 
> _jehan: DON’T BRING EDGAR INTO THIS!!!!!!!!_

“Have you finished telling them we’re alive?” Enjolras said, his bandana gone, wearing a striped shirt.

“Yeah,” Grantaire said, pocketing his phone. “Jehan is happy for us, and he’s probably going to tell you embarrassing things about me.”

“Well, Chetta will tell you all about how I saw you smile for the first time and ran into the kitchen so I wouldn’t try to kiss you, so,” Enjolras said, then froze. “Shit. Shit!”

“Awww, babe,” Grantaire said, “you had a crush on me. That’s so cute.”

“Shut up,” Enjolras said, and took his hand again. “Let’s go.”

 

When they finally walked outside and joined the block party, it was glaringly obvious that they were late; everyone else is either doling out food or hanging around the tables and talking. There’s a lot of wine sitting out, which made Enjolras tighten his grip on Grantaire’s hand. He smiled and squeezed back, because it was sweet, if mostly unnecessary.

But it was the rest of the street, not the big table (made by putting together Joly’s ping-pong table and one of the big tables that Bahorel’s gym used for summer camp registrations), that made Grantaire stop and stare for a second. The neighborhood was decorated, too, and it looked soft and gentle in the late afternoon, with string lights on the few trees that the street had, and on all the stair railings and front porches. There were even lights on some of the fire escapes. It was definitely a testament to Courfeyrac’s enthusiasm for block parties, and to Cosette’s decorating skills.

“Guys!” Bahorel was shouting, waving a hand. “Finally! Jehan brought your mac and cheese, R. Where’ve you been, anyways?”

Grantaire glanced over at Enjolras, finding him looking right back, a slightly mischievous smile playing around the corners of his mouth.

“Making out with my boyfriend,” he yelled back, and Bahorel gave an excited whoop. “You want a play by play?”

“Dude!” Bahorel said. “That’s awesome! Congrats! Both of you!”

Enjolras was snickering, pressing his fist to his mouth in an attempt to stop. Jehan, sitting next to Floreal, was beaming at them.

“Thanks,” Grantaire yelled back.

“It’s something in the air,” Cosette said wisely, from her seat next to Eponine. “Me and Ep, you and Enjolras, Joly and Bossuet and Chetta. Now if only two certain someones would get their shit together, I’ll win the bets.”

“Are the Courf and Ferre bets still on?” Eponine asked. “I thought we stopped them because Courf found out and entered.”

“He entered?” Enjolras said.

Cosette nodded. “He put thirty euro for _never in a million years because Ferre doesn’t like me._ ”

“Oh,” Enjolras said. “To be fair, I would have said that about R a few hours ago.”

“What? Dude, I was so obvious,” Grantaire objected, and Enjolras wrinkled his nose.

“I thought I was being obvious!”

“I was clearly the _more_ obvious of the two of us.”

“Is this how you guys flirt, or what?” Courfeyrac said, dropping into a chair next to Enjolras and looking amused.

“No, when we flirt it’s super cute,” Grantaire said, and Enjolras snickered and rolled his eyes.

“Whatever, Mr. I Suck At Flirting.”

“Whatever, Mr. _I Didn’t Realize My Boyfriend Was Hinting We Make Out._ ”

Feuilly threw a napkin at them from across the table. “Stop flirting!”

“We’re not flirting!” Enjolras said, throwing it back. At the other end of the table, Joly and Bossuet were laughing, and Chetta was hiding her face in her hands. Combeferre and Marius were talking about books, as usual, and Bahorel was eating all the mac and cheese that Grantaire had made, also as usual.

“We’re flirting a little, babe,” Grantaire said, taking Enjolras’s hand again and beaming at him. “But they’ll live. We’re fucking adorable.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heyyy okay so that's it!! i'm honestly not sure where this fic went or where it was going like....ever, i just kind of had fun with it and wrote what came to mind.....i will probably go back through it and edit it someday but tbh i really like it and i really had a good time writing it!! and sorry it took so long to finish omg......i'm a mess
> 
> @ sam i hope you like it aaaaa!!


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